


I Look Forward to Seeing You Every Day

by TheDoctorIsIcecube



Category: Class (TV 2016)
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Before Episode: s01e06 Detained, Friendship, Gen, Growing Up, Introspection, Loneliness, mentioned genocide
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-11-20
Updated: 2016-11-20
Packaged: 2018-09-01 03:07:41
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,015
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8604742
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheDoctorIsIcecube/pseuds/TheDoctorIsIcecube
Summary: When Charlie was little, he was very alone, and that continued for a long time.





	

Charlie didn't realise how lonely he was most of the time. Lots of people were too busy for him, or he was too busy for lots of people. It wasn't something he could easily understand, because he didn't understand emotions.

He'd seen other children playing on the rare times he was allowed out into the cities of Rhodia, and he knew he wasn't the only young person in the palace. But he'd always been alone, nevertheless. Usually, he didn't mind or even notice that he was different and lonely. But sometimes the world got bigger and louder and he realised he was in a little orb all on his own. It was quiet, which he liked, but he wished there were people he could like, too.

His mother and father sort of counted. They would hug him sometimes, although not often, and they'd talk to him. They cared for him, at least a little, and that was the best he could have. But sometimes he wanted more. "Mama," he asked one day, making sure he'd bowed his head to her first. "When am I allowed to have friends?"

"What?" She turned to him, looking almost amused. "Charles, you're the crown prince of Rhodia. You have far more important things to concern yourself with than people your own age."

Charlie nodded. "Thank you, Mother," he said. But inside there was no gratitude. He was lonely and he wanted to concern himself with people his age. The only people he ever spoke to were his tutors, a few members of court publicity and his parents.

"Not a problem, Charles. Now, don't you have a music lesson soon? You don't want to be late." Her tone sounded lighthearted, but Charlie knew from experience that lateness of any form was always severely punished.

He nodded, bowing his head to her again before turning away. Music lessons were fun, but his teacher didn't speak to him, just a pupil. He wanted to go somewhere where he felt like people were talking to him, not at him.

He'd often pondered going down to the servant's quarters on a day when his schedule wasn't quite so busy- there were children down there, small boys and girls who sometimes followed their parents around and bowed to him and waved with grins that suggested that some day they might like to talk to him but they never could. But now he was getting older and his schedule was getting really busy and he never had time to even consider it anymore. He wanted to go, but he couldn't. His mother and father and tutors would be so angry. 

It was a shame, really. All he wanted was one conversation, one person who he could talk to and laugh with and hug and then say goodbye to and feel happy.

Charlie continued to be lonely for a long time. When he got a little older his mother introduced him to people she thought he could marry, but that still made no difference. Those people didn't want to talk to him, they wanted to talk to the Prince of Rhodia, and Charlie was feeling an increasing disconnect between himself and the title.

As the Prince of Rhodia, he had to be polite and upright and perfect, he had to smile and be charming to the important girls that he might one day marry. As Charlie, he just wanted a friend. And he didn't want to marry a girl. He knew his parents had no issue with that, but if he refused like he wanted to…

Time went on, and then there was that Quill rebellion leader. Before the battles were even won there was discussion of her being appointed as a protector and companion for him. The Prince of Rhodia disguised his horror at the idea of having to spend time with the enemy; Charlie tried to hide the secret joy in the concept of a companion.

The war with the Quill was harsh and bloody- Charlie spent days in underground bunkers for his own safety, and in the darkness he might dare to smile at servants hiding with him, to offer them the small comfort of knowing that their prince wasn't falling apart. But it was here that he found, through all his years of isolation, that he didn't know how to talk to them. He'd spent so long craving friendship that he never really noticed that he had no idea how to have one.

The thought saddened him, but he had to accept it. Perhaps it was time to try and grow up like his parents wanted him to. Perhaps after the war with the Quill, it would ease the hearts of his people to see him marry and settle down. He knew that the Rhodians liked him, although he couldn't fathom why when he was so utterly disconnected from them. He knew nothing about them and they knew nothing about him. He thought that disconnect only lead to strife, that was what his studies had taught him, but maybe they liked him because they didn't see the flaws that were hidden so deeply by his speeches. Not that he even wrote his own speeches. It was the same man every time- honestly, discussing what to say to his people was the best conversation Charlie ever got to have with anyone.

He'd once told his speech writer 'but I would never say that'. In return, he'd been told that the Prince of Rhodia who always made the speeches would say that. At the time, it had made Charlie feel like a failure, because he'd failed in showing himself to his people. But maybe it was a good thing they didn't know. Would they want a prince as weak as he was? A prince who preferred to spend his time reading on the balcony of his room and staring longingly down at the people talking and laughing below?

The Quill woman certainly never wanted him. She refused to speak to him unless it was necessary, which was when he ordered her to. He had to order her to eat, and drink, and on a few occasions he had to order her to wash herself. She'd wised up about how humiliating the latter one was, though, so after a few days that problem disappeared.

She seemed determined to let him know in a thousand subtle ways just how hated he was. Not exactly the friendly companion that Charlie had been hoping for, although he realised now that that goal had always been unrealistic. She insulted him so frequently he almost considered ordering her to stop insulting him, but that was pretty much the only interaction he received these days, so he didn't think he could bring himself to. It was mildly cheering to have someone point out how frequently he read, anyway. He'd offered her a few books of her own, and then ordered her to accept them. She'd looked contemptuous, but when Charlie had questioned her the next day, it was clear she'd been reading overnight.

And then everything went horribly wrong. Charlie had never realised just how not alone he was until he was entirely alone. It didn't make sense, it wasn't fair that this had happened. He didn't deserve to be more alone than he ever had been.

Everyone he'd ever known was gone. He's watched some of them die. He'd watched his mother die right before his eyes. There had never been a lonelier time than this, and it was only now that Charlie realised what he'd had before. Everything had been torn away, and then he had to leave his home. The Doctor, despite being his saviour, was no replacement for his entire people, even though they still lived on in the Cabinet. He'd never realised how full of people his life was until they were moved into a box he could only look at during the most private of moments. He could stare into the Cabinet for hours, but no one would talk back. He couldn't even pick out which souls belonged to his parents. The Cabinet was near-infinite, and they could be anywhere.

He was so alone. Stuck in a huge box with an old man who disapproved of genocide and a woman who intended to cause a genocide against the Shadowkin. Charlie struggled against every intent he had to kill them all in every second of each day. He wanted them dead. He knew he could use the Cabinet, and oh, he wanted to, but a part of him knew that he would regret it. So he didn't, and it stayed in his room on board what the Doctor called the TARDIS.

He got lonelier and lonelier, and eventually, at the Quill's insistence (before he wastes away and I die, she said), the Doctor agreed to make arrangements for them to stay somewhere new so he could heal.

A few days later, he brought them to a planet called Earth, which was apparently around the same size and roughly in the same temperature range as Rhodia. He also did something very odd to them both to make them look human- the blueness and the spines, apparently, would frighten humans. Charlie thought that it looked strange, but not unattractive. The culture on Earth was very different, but not outside of his understanding (it was a little, but he was slowly grasping it despite its complexities).

The Doctor told him that he was to pose as a sixth-form student, which apparently meant that he would be attending some form of school. With other people. People his own age. He couldn't hide his excitement at the prospect of knowing people his own age for the first time in his life. He would be able to talk to them and make friends with them and they wouldn't know him as a prince. He'd have people who might even like him for who he was and not because of his status, and honestly, Charlie couldn't ask for anything better. He could have friends, and he would be happy.

He got to the school and he was sorely disappointed. The Doctor had done something funny with his brain so he could learn this human language, but the people here may as well have been speaking a completely different one.

This was clearly going to be harder than it had first seemed. But he wouldn't give up. There were people who saw him as an equal (except maybe that footballer boy who liked to knock his books out of his hands) and therefore he could be friendly with them. He tried very hard, but still he found himself being mostly alone. There were some girls who were very interested in him, but they soon realised that the feelings weren't returned. There was a girl called April, too; she was consistently very nice to him. He hoped she wasn't interested in him, too, because she seemed genuinely friendly. 

Honestly, Charlie was more interested in the attractive boy who sat to his right and one seat behind him in Physics. Matteusz, another boy who seemed to alone almost all the time. Charlie saw him around sometimes, but he never managed to find the words 'can I sit with you'. Now he wasn't isolated, now he sort of knew how to make friends, he found that shyness was his obstacle.

But eventually...eventually he managed. He managed to make friends, and he even managed to ask Matteusz on a date. Of course, it was a shame that what brought their little group together was an incident that resulted in more than one death, but that couldn't be helped. And now he had friends. He had friends who weren't there because of his status or his brains; they were there because they liked him, and that was the best feeling of all. 

They suffered together, and sometimes Ram got a little annoyed at him, but Charlie found he didn't mind. He saw Matteusz all the time, and he looked forward to seeing all his other friends every single day.


End file.
